“I then talked to Paul Ryan, who looked exhausted. Ryan is one of the few Republican lawmakers still trying to make a case against the bill even though most people at this point are only focused on whether Democrats will have the votes to pass it. But Ryan got some of the Democrats on the Rules Committee pretty riled up today during debate.

I asked him if he was frustrated that the bill looked poised to pass Sunday.

“I think it’s a big, big mistake to put this into law. I mean I really do. So that’s frustrating. This is the biggest social policy in 40 years. I think it’s going to be a fiscal explosion and nightmare. I think it’s going to hurt the economy. And we could have done a better job. So yeah, that’s frustrating,” he said.

“Its ‘Alice in Wonderland.’ I just think people are living in a fantasy world if they think that this can be afforded, if they don’t think that this will lead to systematic rationing of health care,” Ryan said.

He mentioned that he was surprised that Democrats had managed to get this far, after looking down and out in January after the loss of Ted Kennedy’s senate seat in Massachusetts.

“I think they’ve just kept their Democrats in a cocoon in Washington and they’re just pounding them with reinforcing messages, and they’re not stepping outside of this town and just looking at the big picture, and just looking at reality. And I think they’re gonna really regret doing this,” he said.

And he added one shot at Blue Dog Democrats who voted against the bill in November but who have flipped to support it.

“Blue Dogs don’t exist any more, as far as I’m concerned. They don’t exist anymore,” he said. “Nobody who calls themselves a Blue Dog and votes for this can ever call themselves a Blue Dog Democrat ever again.”

In a 9:20 PM update, Jon Ward at the The Daily Caller confirms the House will vote on the Senate bill first and then the Reconciliation bill. Keep checking here for Ward’s updates as he reports from Congress.

49 Responses to “Last Call — Health Care Sale Ends Tonight (Updated)”

Why would they vote for the Reconciliation Bill if the Senate Bill passes?
Once that bill, without any changes in language from what was voted on in the Senate, receives 216 Ayes, everyone can go home, because the House will have no way to get the Senate to take up the Reconciliation Bill, and why should the Senate? They passed their bill, and then the House passed their (the Senate) bill, and then they send it down to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue to be signed.
End of deal.

If the Doofii in the House think they can get the Senate to rework its’ own bill, after all this time, they are Dumberer than a Sack of Andrews.

If Stupak and his contingent go for this deal, they deserve every bit of opprobrium that is going to come their way – and perhaps a little Hellfire and Damnation too.

I think the decision to go forward and attempt to pass the bill even after the Brown victory is about money as much as anything else.

If they had walked away from this effort, it would have impacted the financial support from the rich progressives and the unions.

2010 is a lost cause. Too late and the votes will have been too recent. Nancy P. is, as much as anything, walking through the battlefield and shooting the wounded as she demands votes from first and second term members who are almost certain to lose in 2010.

But many of those seats were owned by the GOP until 2006, so she’s really only losing what they have been renting for 4 years, and in doing so she’s getting the Dem Holy Grail passed.

They’ll regroup and plan for 2012, when they will have Obama at the top of the ticket. They’ll raise money like demons for 3 years and plan their comeback from 2010.

Since, thanks to Obama, I’m being laid off I should have no problem making sure Udall, Binghaman, and Hienrich never serve another term in office here in New Mexico. Perhaps they can be carpet baggers in some other state. But I will campain with a vengence against any of them returning for another term. Thank God Richardson is on his way out.

The Republicans have an opportunity to morph into libertarians and get the support of the independents if they do this right. Social conservatives are along for the ride as they could not prevent 2006 and 2008. Abortion is still an issue but it does not dominate Republican policy like it once did.

The Republicans have to pound spending and earmarks and all the corrupt apparatus of modern politics. If they do, and if they sound sincere, they will blow out the Democrats in November. If they sound like business as usual, we will see small gains and no change of control.

This may be the last chance for free market capitalism in our lifetimes. A favorite quotation:

“Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded—here and there, now and then—are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.
This is known as ‘bad luck’.”

Why would they vote for the Reconciliation Bill if the Senate Bill passes?
Once that bill, without any changes in language from what was voted on in the Senate, receives 216 Ayes, everyone can go home, because the House will have no way to get the Senate to take up the Reconciliation Bill, and why should the Senate? They passed their bill, and then the House passed their (the Senate) bill, and then they send it down to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue to be signed.
End of deal.

I think the House will take up the Reconciliation Bill so Pelosi and other Democrats can claim they tried to fix problems that offend their constituencies and so they can claim they tried to clean up the pork and special deals. I doubt Pelosi will work hard to pass the Reconciliation Bill but it gives her cover to say she tried.

The rule sets up the following votes for tomorrow: The first will be on the rule itself; the second the infamous Senate-passed health-care bill, which still includes the Cornhusker Kickback, the Louisiana Purchase, the Gator Aid, and the Cadillac Tax; the third on a motion to recommit on the “sidecar” reconciliation package; and the fourth the on “sidecar” bill itself.

Ryan is a good man. We have so few of them in Washington DC. Most would make even crows throw up.

But 10’s of thousands of conservatives going to DC to oppose this bill combined with thousands of conservatives picketing their local congresscritter’s office (I will see who wants to harass our local weasel, Jay Inslee) will have effect. The real working class is awake. Time to shake the tree and make the parasites fall out.

“2010 is a lost cause. Too late and the votes will have been too recent.”

Now they start talking immigration reform. That accomplishes two things: bring up a GOP wedge issue to get the base demoralized with their leaders and business and whip up the right wing to act stupid towards hispanics.

Tomorrow is an immigration rally. Will it be bigger than today’s hill wingnut ragefest?

My guess is that Pelosi doesn’t have the votes yet, but she is close enough that she believes she can get them on the House floor.

Look for the initial roll call to be a very narrow defeat. Then, rather than close the vote, Pelosi will keep the roll call open as long as she can to twist the two or three arms she needs to twist to push her over the top. This will in some ways be a replay of Delay’s performance in getting the senior perscription drug plan passed in 2003, which pissed off Democrats to no end at the time — the major differences being that the percription drug bill was at least somwhat bipartisan and the bill wasn’t nearly as far reaching and strongly opposed as this one. Oh, and that vote didn’t occur just seven months before an election.

“This will in some ways be a replay of Delay’s performance in getting the senior perscription drug plan passed in 2003, which pissed off Democrats to no end at the time — the major differences being that the percription drug bill was at least somwhat bipartisan and the bill wasn’t nearly as far reaching and strongly opposed as this one. ”

“Prescription drug coverage is actually popular with those it is intended to help, and saves them out-of-pocket money,”

Of course. It’s a freebie. You’d be in big trouble if a freebie didn’t do this to the affected population.

“whereas all polls show this takeover legislation is not popular;”

This has been changing lately. Check out pollster.com. I’m starting to come around to the idea that this may not be the electoral trouble wingnuts want it to be. Specially if there’s some time between now and the election. Next step: fracture GOP with immigration reform.

Though the recent gallup, specially the details of what people liked and didn’t like, also shows some promise. Also the fact that people seem to like Obama talking. Now what’s the campaign? Success on HCR for the dems. Fail for the GOP.

“And, No, last time I checked, Part-D was not a freebie, but was something that you actually have to sign-up for, for a fee, just like Part-B.”

“…Scott Rasmussen released his final pre-vote health care poll. It shows opposition to the Democrats’ government takeover bill as strong as ever, with only 41% of likely voters supporting the legislation, while 54% oppose it…”
-H/T Powerline

Well, I don’t know what it is, since I’ve never paid for it, and don’t use it.

SocSec and Part-A are paid into by all of us while we are working – the so-called “trust fund”.
Part-B has to be signed up for after retirement and paid for, much as I suppose Part-D has to also – you have to opt-in, it is not an automatic program.

If it was an “entitlement”, why is there a charge for it? Sounds more like a service contract to me.

[…] Mine May Go “Boom” and So Many Lies, So Little Time Patterico’s Pontifications: Last Call — Health Care Sale Ends Tonight (Updated) and Health Care: Alive and Kicking (Updated) and Obama’s Great Society On My Watch — The […]

It’s only a subsidy if I receive more in value than I have paid for. Since I don’t “opt-in”, I therefore receive no subsidy, and believe that all such programs should be self-supporting, free of all underwriting by the taxpayer. But then, I also support the “privatization” of Social Security, and most all other programs engaged in by the Federal Government that are extra-Constitutional.
Socialism does lead to equality of outcome, the unfortunate fact that the Left refuses to recognize, is that that equality is destitution and tyranny.

It isn’t something I supported in 2003, it is not something I engage in in 2010; so therefore, it is not a subsidy to me.
But, you as a parasitical growth on the body politic, are welcome to it, if it is still around 50-years from now when you will be eligible for enrollment into it.

And, anyway, from what that has appeared in the media, it seems that this new bill will increase costs to seniors in Part-D, particularly through the cancellation of Medicare Advantage.